Semiconductor materials exhibit controllable optical and electrical properties, such as conductivity, over a wide range. Such control is enabled by use of dopants, which are impurities introduced into the crystalline lattice of the semiconductor material to serve as sources of electrons (negative charges) or holes (positive charges). Controllable doping enables the fabrication of a wide range of semiconductor devices, e.g., light-emitting diodes (LEDs), lasers, and transistors.
Nitride-based semiconductors such as gallium nitride (GaN) and aluminum nitride (AlN) are of great interest technologically, in part because of their wide bandgaps. Controllable and repeatable doping of these materials enables the fabrication of light-emitting devices, such as LEDs and lasers, that emit light at short wavelengths, i.e., at blue, violet, and even ultraviolet wavelengths. Moreover, n- and p-type nitrides can be utilized in the fabrication of transistors suited for high power and/or high temperature applications. In an n-type semiconductor, the concentration of electrons is much higher then the concentration of holes; accordingly, electrons are majority carriers and dominate conductivity. In a p-type semiconductor, by contrast, holes dominate conductivity.
AlN has a relatively large bandgap of 6.1 electron volts (eV) at room temperature, and few dopants for AlN have shallow enough energy levels in the bandgap to facilitate high electrical conductivity with only moderate impurity (i.e., dopant) concentrations. Thus, impurity concentrations often need to be relatively high in order to achieve technologically useful conductivity levels. Unfortunately, achieving high impurity concentration levels in AlN can be difficult. AlN is typically grown at very high temperatures, making it difficult to incorporate high levels of desired dopants in a controlled way while avoiding the introduction of unwanted impurities and other point defects. These will introduce deep levels in the bandgap that counteract the desired effect of the dopant. (That is, the undesired defects will introduce deep levels that will absorb the electrons or holes introduced by the dopant impurities.) In particular, under typical growth conditions, oxygen appears to introduce a deep level in the AlN bandgap and needs to be carefully controlled if conducting crystals are to be produced. Thus, success in creating large, conductive crystals has proven elusive even though AlN thin films with n-type conductivity have been demonstrated.